Governments should compete for residents, not businesses • Hacker News Board

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#341

Post by mannerheim » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 2:21 PM UTC

chewz wrote: post #333

mannerheim wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People forget that modern nation states are a very recent, post-democratic construct, and in the past, states competed for people all the time; the fact that these people spoke a different language and had a different ethnicity mattered little to a monarch who themselves might not have belonged to the ethnicity of the country they ruled. Hence the Prussians bringing Poles to work on the farms in Silesia abandoned by…

Also Germans moving from say Kassel to Hanover or Silesia to Ruhr, or Vienna to Berlin. Very low threshold - same language, culture but lower taxes or better opportunities. Or Poles moving from Galicia (now Western Ukraine) to Argentina or Chicago. At the time it wasn't possible to keep citizens tied within borders so higher personal taxes were impractical.

Yes, but I used these examples because these were migrations within Europe where the ethnicity of the migrants were different than where they moved to.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#342

Post by rajin444 » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 2:54 PM UTC

fnordpiglet wrote: post #309

rajin444 wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it’s safe to assume you think genetics has no impact on life outcomes and/or there aren’t significant genetic differences between geographically (by ancestor) populations? > What makes a person better than another is how they live their life, not the circumstances of their birth. Their genetics dictate how they live their life. Environment can have an affect, but genes dictate how you react to your environmen…

No, I don’t believe in racial superiority. I also don’t believe genetics plays a great role in overall outcomes in life, otherwise known as eugenics. I think that in a population genetic attributes are fairly regular with small specific variances that aren’t enough to make one fitter in any dimension. On an individual level genetics can contribute towards specific traits, including to some degree intelligence and anx…

I never claimed one race was superior to the other - just different (and these differences make cultural cohesion difficult).

> However the magic of the plasticity of the human brain is that it can, with effort, overcome virtually any impediment

That’s quite the claim depending on how you define impediment, but as is this statement is too vague to argue with.

> I’d also point out that the more homogeneous the genetic population the worse overall outcomes tend to be.

Again this is a very vague statement where the degree of variation matters. Hybrid vigor is poorly understood and when the differences are too great result in genetically worse offspring on some axis (mules are a perfect example of this).

> So, yes, I think science is total against the idea of racial superiority not just out of its repugnant but just false and furthermore given the homogeneity issue impossible.

I’ve made no claims of superiority and you’re taking a holier than though stance against the straw man you made up. Please leave the emotional appeals out.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#343

Post by revlolz » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 3:03 PM UTC

hermannj314 wrote: post #16

I've owned houses in two cities in my life. One called itself "A developer-friendly community" and the other "A healthy community" The cities were organized around their taglines. One was 300 years old and focused on parks, trails, conservancy, and community centers. The other a younger city focused on growth and sprawl, tax abatements, and new businesses. You should live where the government aligns with your phase o…

How do you find out what kind of city a place is? This might seem downright stupid to say, but I don't even know what types to even be looking for.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#344

Post by lolinder » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 3:11 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #324

lolinder wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You’re correct that it’s important for Americans not to project their sensibilities onto others. But it’s also important for cosmopolitan urban Americans not to project their sensibilities onto other Americans. A significant chunk of America is populated by the immigrant groups that developed the region in the first place. For the record, I'm not a cosmopolitan urban American. I'm in a deep red state in flyover cou…

[flagged]

> Obviously stereotypes about assuming any individual is a drug dealer is racist. But I think it’s reductionist to say that’s really the only place opposition to immigration is coming from.

Nowhere have I argued for any particular immigration policy. Immigration law is complicated and I get that. I have only taken a stance against nationalism. We can have a rational discussion about immigration without resorting to nationalist stereotypes and rhetoric.

> Italian immigrants brought the Mafia with them—the turn of the 20th century was a peak in the country’s foreign born population and also its homicide rate.

https://blogs.berkeley.edu/2010/06/16/a-crime-puzzle-violent...

https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/imm...

Not the stats I'm finding. Foreign-born population as a percentage is pretty constant from 1870 to 1910, while murder peaks between 1920 and 1930, after the foreign-born population has already started its precipitous decline. Murder then begins a dramatic increase in the 1970s, a decade in which the foreign-born population is at an all time low. Between 1990 and 2020 the murder rate has dropped dramatically even as the foreign-born population has grown to levels not seen since 1920.

This is exactly the kind of nationalistic rhetoric I object to. People spout "facts" that they heard from other people that would at best amount to a correlation if the numbers were true—and the numbers rarely are true—and use those "facts" as justification for stereotypes.

> Folks created settlements and kept to themselves.

Not really. The early settlers in my area fought wars with and displaced the natives—there are place names around here that still reflect those battles. The same is true in Oregon, as anywhere else in the Americas.

> And immigrants do change the culture.

Agreed! I'm observing it right now in my area.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#345

Post by FpUser » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 3:20 PM UTC

rootusrootus wrote: post #308

FpUser wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the end result? Something like you are to reside in this town an we'll let you out twice a year for vacation and XMas? Want to move to other city - there is a waiting list 10 years long.

Controlled migration for the foreseeable future. Maybe if the entire world reaches a broadly similar level of human development, including comparable levels of infrastructure and social support, migration can be opened up quite a bit. But right now it would simply mean that developed nations would see a flood of people immigrating just to get those great services, and it would crush their system. So we need controls…

>"Controlled migration for the foreseeable future."

Never mind migration. Even travel gets worse. We've had relatively frictionless travel between first world countries. Now it it only 3 month instead of 6 and online visas like ESTA. So it does not seem to get any better and does not correlate so "comparable levels".

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#346

Post by hermannj314 » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 3:59 PM UTC

revlolz wrote: post #343

hermannj314 wrote: post #16

I've owned houses in two cities in my life. One called itself "A developer-friendly community" and the other "A healthy community" The cities were organized around their taglines. One was 300 years old and focused on parks, trails, conservancy, and community centers. The other a younger city focused on growth and sprawl, tax abatements, and new businesses. You should live where the government aligns with your phase o…

How do you find out what kind of city a place is? This might seem downright stupid to say, but I don't even know what types to even be looking for.

Visit and take a walk around. Look at the minutes of the city council, see what they are focusing on.

There are endless rhetorical questions to ask yourself: Where are you in your life and how do you define yourself? Do you prefer cafes or clubs; care about schools and parks? Safety or autonomy? How do you want to commute? Do you want small shops or shopping centers? Small town monoculture or big city diversity? Do you want to your city to attract tourists or be hostile to them?

A city government has a lot of levers to pull to build a city around each of these things, and some do it poorly and some it well.

Don't move to Moline, Illinois or Cupertino, CA and not expect to find a city that bends to the will of John Deere/ Apple respectively. Some cities exist to serve a large corporation above all else (since the entire population works for them). Others exist to serve the local University or the tourist board, and others the soccer moms. None are wrong, they are all trying to find a local maximum to serve the people that live there.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#347

Post by anotherman554 » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 4:03 PM UTC

lesuorac wrote: post #261

stale2002 wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Only if by "secure" you mean prevent your population from leaving Did you think about this statement for even 1 second? It should be clearly and immediately obvious that it is easier to leave places like the US than it is to enter it. This is obviously the case. You cannot with a straight face claim that actually it is easier to enter the US than leave. Clearly, leaving is easier.

There are 4x [1] the amount of people that annually enter the US than have passports issued [2]. It is in fact, 4x easier to enter the US than to leave. Passports are actually rare for a US citizen to have, you just live in a bubble. [1]: https://www.trade.gov/sites/default/files/2021-03/Fact%20She... [2]: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/about-us/reports-...

Your post is weird. Why would the amount of visitors to a country have anything to do with passports issued? The U.S. is less than 5% of the world's population. That's a hard limit on the amount of passports that can be issued.

The amount of visitors would be limited by the size of the tourism industry and regulations around entry visas. This is an unrelated metric.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#348

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 5:41 PM UTC

CalRobert wrote: post #228

hintymad wrote: post #189

How does Bay Area fit in the narrative? From my personal point of view, Bay Area, where I live, offers very little to its residents: public schools have super low standards and low teaching qualities. Many of the schools use seemingly run-down portables while public schools in other states, such as WA, have amazing buildings and facilities. More than 1/3 of the families in the Bay Area choose private schools, the hig…

If you're in one of the older areas (SF, Berkeley, Oakland) it's one of the few places on the west coast you can live an urban lifestyle in a walkable city.

[deleted]

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#349

Post by comte7092 » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 5:48 PM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #336

comte7092 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes indeed, however that isn’t really an economic development model most would want to hold up as an ideal.

Those small towns won't get anything better and know it do they consider it their best possible model.

Yes, I’m just saying that I don’t see how that is a generalizable mode outside of that narrow circumstance.

There may be a large number of small towns, but most people and most economic activity happens in larger urban areas, and that’s what is germane to the article’s argument.

Re: Governments should compete for residents, not businesses

#350

Post by rayiner » Thu, Mar 09, 2023, 6:01 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #340

rayiner wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Racism” is where southern white people don’t like southern black people despite being from the same place and sharing highly overlapping culture, religion, and values. When you’re talking about different groups of people from different cultures that’s not “racism.” My parents, who grew up in Bangladesh, an extremely hierarchical and traditional society, couldn’t be more different from my wife’s parents, who are desc…

No, racially-motivated prejudice in either direction between your parents and your wife's parents is, in fact, also racism, despite the fact that neither group was born in the south or has "overlapping culture". Xenophobia is a form of racism; globally, it's probably the most common form.

Incorrect. It’s totally fine to not get along with other people—and certainly to not want to share a democratic polity with them—based on cultural differences. There’s no reason why people who escaped west to get away from elites should we to to share a polity with foreign elites who think the “common people” need to be carefully managed. Conversely, there’s no reason why folks who believe in rigid social hierarchy and norm enforcement should want to live around people who are pathologically individualistic.

That’s entirely unrelated to “racism” or “xenophobia,” which is stereotyping or prejudice based on superficial rather than substantive differences.